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Memoirs of the City of London and Its Celebrities. (Volume 2)

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Memoirs of the City of London and Its Celebrities. (Volume 2) MEMOIRS OF THE CITY OF LONDON AND ITS CELEBRITIES. (VOLUME 2) By John Heneage Jesse CHAPTER I. THE PRIORY AND CHURCH OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW. St. Bartholomew's Priory and Church When, Btfilt.-j-Jt* Present Appearance Refectory, Crypt, and Subterranean Passage Bartholomew Close Monuments in the Church Story of Rahere, Founder of the Priory Fracas in the Priory St. Bartholomew's Hospital Canonbury Canonbury Tower Goldsmith's Residence Prior Bolton's Residence Bartholomew Fair. ON the southeastern side of Smithfield stand the remains of the beautiful church and once vast and wealthy priory of St. Bartholomew, founded by Rahere, the first prior, in the reign of Henry the First. At the time of the suppression of the religious houses in the reign of Henry the Eighth, it was distinguished by its vast extent of building, its beautiful and shady gardens, its exquisite cloisters, its grand refectory, its fish-ponds, and by all the appurtenances of a great monastic establishment. Its mulberry garden, planted by Prior Bolton, was famous. Passing under a gateway rich with carved roses and zigzag ornaments, we enter the fine old church of St. Bartholomew. As we gaze on the solidity of its massive pillars, its graceful arches, and the beauty of its architectural details, we are at once impressed with that sense of grandeur and solemnity which only such a scene can inspire. The remains of the old church are in the Norman style of architecture, and are apparently of the same date as the earlier portions of Winchester, Cathp^r?.!. Some notion of its former magnificen.ce. rnay be conceived, when we mention that ttie' iprftsent -cKurch is merely the chancel of the ancient edifice. Surrounded by mean hovels and by a population of the lowest description, the exterior of the ancient priory, though degraded to strange purposes, is notwithstanding scarcely less interesting than the interior. Beauty and decay meet us at every step. In order to view the noble arches of the ancient cloisters, we must dive into a timberyard ; while the old refectory, formerly one of the noblest halls in London, has long been converted into a manufactory. The fine oaken roof still remains. The exterior of the building has been sadly modernised, and the interior has been subdivided by intermediate roofs and ceilings, but still sufficient remains to recall vividly to our imaginations the days when this noble apartment was the scene of ecclesiastical hospitality, and brilliant with all the splendid paraphernalia of the Church of Rome. The refectory stands on the south side of the church, near the end of the south transept, and is immediately connected with the beautiful eastern cloister, which, with its clustered columns and carved bosses, is now the only one which remains. Beneath the refectory is the ancient crypt, which, notwithstanding the beauty of its architecture, and its rare state of preservation, is but seldom visited and but little known. It is of great length, with a double row of finely proportioned aisles. At the extremity of this gloomy and vaulted crypt is a door, which, according to tradition, opens into a subterranean passage extending to Canonbury, formerly a rural appendage of the priors of St. Bartholomew, at Islington. Similar idle stories are not unfrequently attached to old monastic ruins, as in the cases of Malmesbury, Netley, and Glastonbury. That the door in question, however, was formerly used as a means of escape in the hour of danger, there is reason to believe. Till very recently it opened into a cellar which extended beneath a chapel, known as St. Bartholomew's Chapel, which was destroyed by fire in 1830. This chapel is known to have been secretly used by the Reformers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the passage we have referred to having afforded them a ready means of escape in the event of their being disturbed by the officers of the law. Consequent on the accumulation of the dust of centuries, the ground which encompasses the church of St. Bartholomew has gradually risen three or four feet, and the foundations of the nave and the entrances to the edifice are now considerably below the soil of the churchyard. As regards the eastern cloister, to such a height has the soil accumulated, that the spring of the arches is now level with the ground. At the south side of the church was the great close of the old priory, the site of which is now occupied by modern buildings, but which still bears the name of Bartholomew Close. The lesser close, in which stood the prior's stables, the kitchens, and offices, was situated at the east end of the church, and also still preserves its designation of the Little Close. The former is especially interesting from its connection with the fortunes of Milton. At the Restoration of Charles the Second, the prominent part which the great poet had acted under the Protectorate had rendered him a proscribed man, and accordingly we find him seeking a refuge in the house of a friend in Bartholomew Close, where he remained concealed till he found himself included in the general amnesty. Doctor Johnson thinks, and with some reason, that his escape was secretly favoured by the government. That he was in the custody of the sergeantat-arms, at least for a short time, is proved by the following curious entries in the books of the House of Commons: "Saturday, December 15, 1660, ordered that Mr. Milton, now in custody of the sergeant-at-arms attending this House, be forthwith released on paying his fees." And again, on Monday, the 1 7th : " A complaint made that the sergeant-at-arms had demanded excessive fees for the imprisonment of Mr. Milton ; ordered that it be referred to the Committee for Privileges to examine this business, and to call Mr. Milton and the sergeant before them, and to determine what is fit to be given the sergeant for his fees in this case." After his liberation, Milton took up his abode in Holborn, near Red Lion Fields. In Bartholomew Close resided that classical artist, Hubert le Soeur, to whom we owe the beautiful statue of Charles the First at Charing Cross. He had a son, Isaac, who was buried on the 2Qth of November, 1630, in the neighbouring church of St. Bartholomew. Here, too, Benjamin Franklin carried on his vocation of a journeyman printer for nearly a year. The most interesting monument in St. Bartholomew's Church is that of the founder of the Priory, Rahere. This fine specimen of the pointed style of architecture represents the effigy of the founder in his prior's dress, recumbent beneath a canopy, with an angel kneeling at his feet, and monks praying by his side. The monument is inscribed : " Hie jacet Raherus, Primus Canonicus, et primus Prior hujus Ecclesiae." It bears no date, but from its style of architecture it must have been erected many years after the death of the founder. Another interesting monument in St. Bartholomew's Church is that of Sir Walter Mildmay, founder of Emanuel College, Cambridge, who acted a prominent part as a courtier and a statesman during the reigns of Henry the Eighth, Edward the Sixth, and Queen Elizabeth. He was one of the commissioners sent to Fotheringay Castle to conduct the trial of Mary Queen of Scots, and it was to him personally that the unfortunate queen addressed herself when she pleaded her innocence of the crimes with which she was charged, and denied the right of Elizabeth to bring her to trial. The monument to Sir Henry, which is finely executed in marble, and of great size, presents a mixture of the Gothic and classic styles of architecture, the union of which in the sixteenth century was then for the first time coming into vogue. The circumstances which led to the foundation of the priory of St. Bartholomew are full of interest. Rahere, though a man of mean lineage, was endowed by nature with all those graceful qualities of mind and body which help to make up for the deficiencies of birth. Witty and lively in his disposition, an accomplished libertine, and a finished musician, he was gifted with all those arts which render their possessor welcome to the tables of the great, and which, in the days when literature was almost entirely confined to the priesthood, were a certain pass-key to the bower of the lady and the revels of her lord. His sovereign, Henry the First, delighted in his society. Rahere charmed him by his songs, and fascinated him by his wit. According to an old monkish writer, " He often haunted the king's palace, and among the noiseful press of that tumultuous court conformed himself with polity and cardinal suavity, by the which he drew to himself the hearts of many a one. There, in spectacles, in meetings, in plays, and other courtly mockeries and trifles, he led the business of the day. This-wise to the king and great men ; gentle and courteously known, familiar and fellowly he was." x Of the circumstances which impelled the courtly Rahere to exchange a life of voluptuousness and pleasure for one of asceticism and sanctity, but little appears to be known. He was still in the full vigour of life, still in the full enjoyment of its gratifications, when, on a sudden, he absented himself from his accustomed haunts, and "decreed himself [to go to the court of Rome, coveting in so great a labour to do the works of penance." " While he tarried there," says the same old monkish writer, "he began to be vexed with grievous sickness, and his dolours encreasing, he drew to the extreme of life ; the which, dreading within himself that he had not yet satisfied God for his sins, he supposed that God took vengeance of him for them amongst outlandish people, and deemed that the last hour of his death drew nigh.
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